No, it is not what you were thinking. But they are Canadian, so technically that makes them foreigners, right? Today, June 20, 2008 is an anniversary of sorts around our place. On this date, five years ago we moved to this piece of land that we value so highly. In the past five years we have spent all of our time, energy and money on "fixin-up" this place. In the past five years we have had to deal with a number of issues that we never expected. That is what brings us to the subject of foreign invaders. When we were dreaming of having a 100 acres of land, it never occurred to us that we would have to deal with invaders.We don't consider the coyotes,bobcats, hawks and owls that have killed our chickens, ducks and geese as invaders. They are doing what they were meant to do.We aren't talking about fire ants that weren't here when we arrived but now are everywhere.The howling of a lone wolf in the distance isn't a problem for us. My Dad even saw a bear a few miles down the road. If Mr. Bear is jut passing through and doesn't plan on making one of our animals his next meal, then he's also welcome and will not be put on the list of foreign invaders. We do realize that with the animals that WE are actually the invaders since most of them were there before we arrived and do have certain rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We don't classify the herons and other water birds that hang out in our ponds. However other invaders have caused more problems than we anticipated. When we moved here, the cattle that graze the government land thought that our place was just an extension of their grazing lease. They made themselves at home in our pasture and came right on into the barn as if they owned that too. The cattle guard at our front gate has deteriorated somewhat and the cows think that it is just a moo-cow welcome mat. We began to keep the front gate closed after waking up one morning to find a dozen or so of them in our newly planted vegetable garden and fruit tree orchard. We've worked on finding and repairing the little weak spots in the fence that they cross through to get into our pasture. Since our place is surrounded by a wildlife management area, the river bottoms and a lake, the deer and turkey are a daily sight. Which brings me to the next point. It occurred to me that when someone invades your territory they are only considered invaders IF they are UNWELCOME. We welcome the deer and wild turkey, so I guess they won't be classified as foreign invaders. The pair of Canadian geese that have come to swim in our pond and graze on the sweet new grass every spring are also welcome. So I guess they aren't really invaders either. However, the people from town that dump off their unwanted pets are not welcome at our place. In five years we've had more than our fair share of that type of invaders. The "dumped" cats reek havoc by fighting with our cats. The "dumped" dogs have killed our pet goose and a few of our ducks and our guinea. We did learn a valuable lesson through that experience. The next time a "dumped" dog shows up we will not "run it off", we will speak kindly to it and feed it. We've learned that it is better to catch it and find it a new more suitable home, as we did with the last canine invader.
This past springtime flooding caused an invasion of a different sort. The river bottoms were underwater. The wild hogs ( feral pigs ) began living in our pastures, foraging for their meals by rooting around and tearing up the pasture. One morning we woke up to find more than twenty of the porkers just outside of our yard fence. There were big ones, little ones, dark ones, light ones and spotted ones. Now, if that wasn't bad enough, it got worse when the locals started hunting them by running them with a pack of dogs. What happens on the government land which I refer to as The Deliverance Zone (another story for another day), isn't actually any of our business. But when the pig hunters run their dogs onto our land, it does constitute an invasion. The dogs chasing the hogs through our pasture almost caused a serious accident in the blind horse habitat. The sound of the yapping dogs chasing the squealing pigs caused our two blind horses to freak out and run into the fences. Grace slammed into a T-post and bent it over. Fortunately, the damage was only a few minor scratches and a damaged fence. But as we see it, we moved all the way out here to be able to live in peace with our many animals without having to deal with other people and their issues. Now comes the part that really upset us. We were invaded by the most unacceptable foreign invaders of all. ROCK POACHERS.....the most dangerous, most destructive and the most unwelcome. Humans that cut our back fence lines and cut down trees to drive their truck and trailers onto our land to STEAL big flat mossy rocks. In this area, there are a number of stone companies that buy rock for landscaping purposes. With 17,000 acres of government land behind us,that they could steal rocks from, we thought that it was totally unacceptable to trespass and violate our private property. We had our first contact with the local sheriff's department. They came out, took photos and made a report. I think they thought we were being unreasonable to protest the deeds of the rock poachers. We on the other hand, took action of our own. We posted private property signs and added extra T-post to make them work much harder at stealing our rocks. We spent the winter months cutting trails along our property lines to be able to "ride the fence lines", either on horseback or with the 4-wheeler. "They" promptly blew holes in our signs with their shotguns, so we just post more. We make sure to ride the fence lines often, and unlike in the Old West, we ride with a cell phone on one hip and a holstered pistol on the other to keep a eye our for the the next invasion.
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